Going Wild
by FannyT
Summary: When Lupin left to join the werewolves, his life started spiralling slowly downwards. Because the danger of life in the pack isn't only other werewolves and their brutality towards an outsider it's what sleeps inside, waiting to be woken up. It's the wol


**Warning! If you haven't yet read Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, I suggest you do not read on. This story contains massive spoilers. **

…**That said, I hope you enjoy it. :)**

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Going Wild

_Going wild_

_Going out of control_

_Going past_

_Past the border_

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It was one of those nights. The veil fluttered madly in the breeze that wasn't there, swaying to and fro in a hectic dance, twisting itself into endless new shapes and billowing invitingly into the archway. Then Bellatrix's face loomed before him, huge and distorted like a clown's, laughing, laughing, laughing… her tongue poked out of her mouth, red and slimy, and turned into a snake that wound its way across the floor and coiled around his leg, rearing its head until its scaly skin touched at his throat, nuzzled its way to the nape of his neck. And then it became a hand, Sirius's hand that ruffled his hair after he'd made a joke. And Sirius laughed, happily and boyishly, laughed until his voice changed into Bellatrix's again and Sirius was lying dead at her feet, blood in his mouth, eyes staring at nothing, but that was wrong because Sirius had never lain on the ground with his eyes staring at nothing, Sirius had merely gone, fallen through the veil and you could kid yourself and say he wasn't dead, he was _gone_, which was really the same but still slightly better…

He woke up suddenly, sitting up straight in his bed. His breathing was fast, agitated and he put his hands to his temples, pressing against them in an attempt to forget about it all. As usual it was not very effective. Bellatrix's laughter still echoed inside his head, Sirius still fell through the veil, over and over…

He swung his legs over the side of the bed, wincing as his feet touched the cold floor. Shivering slightly, he made his way out into the kitchen and put some tea on. As the kettle boiled he sat down at the table, rubbing his face with his hands. Nights like these were long; long and lonely. Yet even these were not the worst ones. Because there were nights when he woke up screaming, raking his nails across his face, wishing he would die… When he drifted in and out of sleep in a never-ending nightmare starring himself: the man-eating werewolf.

Those were the nights when he wished he could dream forever, because then he would not have to face the reality of it: that the nightmare was not only a fancy… it was also true.

As he thought of those nights Tonks's face entered his mind, suddenly and with a burst of colour. Tonks – happy, young, beautiful Tonks – who had become part of his world for a short time. He had thought he could find relief with her… and he did, for a little while. For a short time she was able to dispel the blackness of his nights and bring him comfort. She lit up his life with her laughter, the laughter he hadn't realized that he loved more than anything else until it disappeared.

Yet he had to leave her. It was not the fact that he was poor, outcast and too old for her. It was the fact that he was a murderer.

He had followed Dumbledore's request and gone with the wolves. He had given up on all he had ever believed, turning feral again, hunting by moonlight. He had scorned humanity, growing wilder by the day. He had played his part well… too well. Slowly, almost without his noticing it, the wolf had begun to take him over. He had enjoyed the wild chase by night, he had relished in every aching muscle the day after and he had longed for the next time with all his heart. He had started to love it.

Living wild was dangerous; it grew on you.

Since he no longer took the Wolfsbane potion, he no longer knew anything of what he did during those nights. He remembered only a delirious joy, the ecstasy of running free. The vague feeling of unease that accompanied each morning after a full moon was pushed to the back of his mind, ignored. He started avoiding his reports back to Dumbledore and the others, talked less and less with his pack mates about returning to humanity, stopped pushing them to give up their dangerous living. Danger was everything. Without the rush of adrenaline, there could be only a half life. Gradually the exchange with the other Order of the Phoenix members stopped completely and he ignored even the correspondence from Tonks – hurt, desperate letters that asked the same questions over and over with an ever rising tone of panic: Where are you, Remus? What are you doing? Why won't you answer? Answer me, Remus! He turned his mind away from the letters, drowning the guilt in another chase, another night. Living there, with his werewolf mates, he felt more complete and more alive than he'd ever done. This was his calling. They couldn't understand him, the wizards and witches who thought they knew all – but they knew nothing! They didn't know who he was… but the other werewolves did. He was one of them. And he loved the companionship, loved being a part of something bigger.

It all ended the morning he woke to find strips of cotton fabric caught in his teeth.

He had stumbled blindly from the lair, not even hearing the questioning calls of his pack mates. The same phrase beat in his head, over and over. He had killed. _He had killed._ He had killed had killed had killed had killed…

He was far from the lair when he came to his senses, cold, shivering, wild with horror. He put his head back and, as if the wolf had not completely left him yet, howled at the sky; a long broken wail that ended in sobs.

He contacted Dumbledore two hours later, speaking to him through the mirror he had ignored for weeks, and said that he had to abandon his mission. Dumbledore said nothing, asked nothing, a fact for which he was grateful. Without even returning to gather his measly belongings he Apparated back as soon as he had finished the conversation with the older wizard. It took him three tries to get back. For weeks he had been burying his knowledge of magic, and it took all his energy to summon the concentration needed for an Apparation. On the first attempt he appeared in London, miles from his destination. The second try went equally awry, landing him in Sussex, and he suspected it was pure luck that brought him to Hogsmeade the next time. How he had even managed to avoid splinching himself he would never know.

Dumbledore had been standing outside the Three Broomsticks when he arrived, still not saying anything but the necessary. Come in, Remus. You'll sleep here, Remus. Take a bath, Remus.

If you want to talk, I'm here, Remus.

Now, one and a half year later, Remus laughed at that promise. It had been sincere, of course, and the Headmaster had indeed been there for him when he cried, screaming over the sheer abhorrence of what he had done. But how did that help him now? And how did it help even back then when the Ministry officials came to visit, asking their poking, probing questions and talking about therapy? How did that help when, one and a half month after he returned home, he lay in St Mungo's and heard a nurse speak softly, because she thought he was asleep, "It can sometimes happen… that they go back. It's something in their nature, I suppose. He's convinced he's killed someone during that time. Is that possible, do you think? He looks so nice and kind." And the wizard from the Werewolf Capture Unit answering her, solemnly, "Many of them look nice. I think you'd better give him a separate room, to be on the safe side."

He had got through Christmas at the Burrow somehow. He had talked, answered questions calmly and lightly, even smiled (he seemed to recall). It wasn't until Christmas was over that he broke down completely; throwing himself at the walls of his flat in London, beating on them until his hands bled, desperately trying to punish himself for his crime… although there could never be any forgiveness for what he had done.

Sometime later he lay in his hospital bed, curling up around himself and pressing his face into his pillow. He had gone to St Mungo's because he craved the Sleeping Draughts and calming potions they gave him, yearned for the oblivion they launched him into. The potions couldn't block out everything, however. Whenever he came out of the potion-induced stupor, a face would float to the front of his mind. The face would change from one day to the next, but one thing would always be the same: the look of stark terror. This was the human he had killed, he knew. And he lay in the bed at St Mungo's and tried to imagine what his victim looked like until he was certain he was losing his mind.

But then Tonks had come, like sunshine. She had sat by his side for some time every day – sometimes longer, sometimes shorter, depending on the amount of work she had – and she had stroked his face, murmured soft words into his ear. She hadn't once mentioned his terse letters during the time he started to lose it, or his lack of contact completely at the end.

Her hair had been brown and lanky, and he remembered vaguely wondering about it.

One beautiful morning he was released into Tonks's care. And for weeks on end she took care of him, talked to him, held him when the nightmares came back to haunt him. He had never questioned this before but now as he sat in his kitchen, waiting for the kettle to boil (as always it was taking ages), he realized yet again just how much he had her to thank for. The return of his sanity; he doubted if anyone else had been able to manage that.

But still… still… the WCU had found out nothing. No local disappearances around the time he left the pack, no talk of people killed. It meant little. The area was used to werewolves, and someone who left his home on a moonlit night wasn't reported missing – he was assumed dead from the moment he walked through the door. So the results of the investigation did little to ease his guilt, and every time he looked at his hands he imagined them as clawed paws, stained with human blood.

"But how can you know?" Tonks had asked him. "You could have stumbled over a… a washing line or anything, getting the cloth caught in your teeth somehow, I don't know… it doesn't have to mean that you killed."

"But I know!" he had roared, shouting into her shocked face. "I fucking know, I feel it, I _know_…"

He had regretted his outburst later, of course, and had gone to her to dry her tears and hold her in his arms. But when she tried to tell him what he meant to her he stopped her, not wanting to hear. "I love you," she had whispered many times as she comforted him after a bad dream, but he refused to hear her say it in daylight. Because that would make it true… and he didn't want to know he had done that to her. Made her love him.

Some part of his mind would always reason that you couldn't make someone fall in love. Another would love that she had, would embrace all the warmth she gave him with unending gratitude. The third part of him turned its back on the other two, just as he turned his back on her when she tried to talk about him, about her, about them. Cutting her off, walking away.

"So stubborn," she said later, as she kissed his throat. "So terribly stubborn."

Yes, Tonks. But not for the reasons you think.

The time with Tonks had been glorious. Not even the death of Dumbledore could overshadow the joy he felt at sharing his life with her. For half a year, seven months, they lived together and he loved it. His life was bright with Tonks around, and he was able to forget about his failed mission… or at least postpone thinking about it.

But it had caught up with him, as he knew it would. The dreams had come back, more and more frequent, and not even Tonks and the words she whispered as she wrapped her arms around his waist could stop them returning. His victim – victims? Had there been more than one? – cried out to him at night, begging him to please stop, to leave them alone and go…

Tonks tried, but she was so young. Living with him, touched every day by his despair and self-disgust, was too much for even her. She stopped doing the noses at dinner, and became quieter by the day. And when he woke one morning and saw her staring teary-eyed into the mirror, before she turned to him with a start and explained she felt like mousy hair today, he knew he had to leave. It simply wasn't fair on her to stay.

Looking back now, he wondered how she was doing. Had she forgotten him, maybe found someone new? He hoped so.

He stirred, looked out of the window at the half moon. He smiled ruefully, shaking his head to try and clear it. There was so much running through his mind. There always was. Whatever he was pondering, other thoughts kept pushing their way in, like they were doing even now. Sirius, his death and what could have been done to prevent it. Peter. (And the betrayal, when Peter had sold them all… the endless questions of how and where and when… and _why_, always the why.) The war that had been going on openly for just under a year now. Harry and Voldemort. Snape and Draco. And of course Dumbledore, who he sometimes cried for and sometimes despised for dying. When he died, the underground assignment to the werewolves was rendered useless – without Dumbledore to explain, the mission would never be approved. So all the guilt that gnawed at his heart, that had ruined his relation with Tonks and was now slowly destroying his life – it had all been for nothing.

And here he sat… in the dark, alone, hating himself and waiting for a kettle to boil. With all his closest friends dead, or turned traitor (which was probably worse, when you thought about it. Only he didn't want to think about it. Not now, not ever). Shunned by society, hated by his own kind for the betrayal of leaving them for wizards. And having pushed his last chance at happiness, the one he had loved, because of a _noble reason_. (Who was he kidding?)

How much more pathetic could you get?

_The End_

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Hello! Fanny again, with another Lupin-centered fic (of course). Not the first and with all probability – to be quite honest, with certainty – not the last.

I can't really think of anything to say.

The lyrics in the beginning are from a song I don't know the name or artist of. (I know, I know, I suck.) If you know anything about the song – would you tell me, pretty please? I'd like to get hold of it.

Ciao!


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